The first several paragraphs are excerpts from Bastiat's "The Law". The last paragraph is made up of excerpts from Ronald Reagan's immortal speech "A Time For Choosing".
Please listen to these messages from two of history's most important minds that have turned simple words into the magic of great ideas:
"In the first place the word universal conceals a gross fallacy. For example, there are 36 million people in France. Thus, to make the right of suffrage universal, there should be 36 million voters. But the most extended system permits only 9 million people to vote. Three persons out of four are excluded. And more than this, they are excluded by the fourth. This fourth person advances the principle of incapacity as his reason for excluding the others...And why is incapacity a motive for exclusion? Because it is not the voter alone who suffers the consequences of his vote; because each vote touches and affects everyone in the entire community; because the people in the community have a right to demand some safeguards concerning the acts upon which their welfare and existence depend...if the law had always been what it ought to be. In fact, if law were restricted to protecting all persons, all liberties, and all properties; if law were nothing more than the organized combination of the individual's right to self defense; if law were the obstacle, the check, the punisher of all oppression and plunder, is it likely that we citizens would then argue much about the extent of the franchise?...If the law were confined to its proper functions, everyone's interest in the law would be the same. Is it not clear that, under these circumstances, those who voted could not inconvenience those who did not vote?
"The Fatal Idea of Legal Plunder
"But on the other hand, imagine that this fatal principle has been introduced: Under the pretense of organization, regulation, protection, or encouragement, the law takes property from one person and gives it to another; the law takes the wealth of all and gives it to a few, whether farmers, manufacturers, ship owners, artists, or comedians. Under these circumstances, then certainly every class will aspire to grasp the law, and logically so.
"The excluded classes will furiously demand their right to vote, and will overthrow society rather than not to obtain it...." Frederich Bastiat 1850
"This is the issue of this election: Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capitol can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves...Our Democratic opponents seem unwilling to debate these issues. They want to make you and I believe that this is a contest between two men...that we're to choose just between two personalities."
"You and I have a rendezvous with destiny...We have come to a time for choosing; we will preserve for our children this the last best hope for man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness." Ronald Reagan 1964
Here is the message that needs repetition lest we forget: The media and both political parties want voters to believe elections are about choosing "our leaders" for a reason. If the body of our laws restricted government to its legitimate functions, political leaders would have very little power and nobody would care much who exercised it.
But the truth is, political leaders desire unlimited powers and the ability to change the law puts the power to gain ever more power within their grasp.
As long as individual people can make their own decisions about how we live our lives, We the people have the power and our freedom. The choice of which leaders run the government would not be terribly material most of the time.
But when political leaders have the power to change the law in a way that limits the number, or the nature, of the decisions that We the people can make for ourselves, then we have lost our freedom and WE the people must focus on the issues of the election in such a way that is most likely to allow us as individuals to recover our lost freedom.
Sometimes the candidates matter as Avatars for the issues, particularly in the primaries. Cain and Palin are easily understood Avatars that matter a lot.
In contrast, most Republicans and conservatives would be delighted to see Newt win the Republcian nomination, but Newt would be a terribly flawed choice and a delusionary avatar. Proof? Try this.
As Ronald Reagan said, "This Is The Issue Of This Election.".
Thank you for sharing your insights!
I really don’t see the point of Palin running.
She’s missed the filing date for South Carolina, which was the 1st.
Our choices are for better or for worse, Cain, or Romney. If you don’t want Romney, then Cain is your man.
I don’t know you newbie, or how you got me on your ping list but please remove me, thanks.
Since I fall into neither category, I'm not sure why you pinged me. Remove me from whatever ping list you concocted.
True, but I'd still take him ten times over Romney.
Thanks Vintage Freeper.
>> “In contrast, most Republicans and conservatives would be delighted to see Newt win the Republcian nomination” <<
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I think a small, uninformed handful would, certainly not “most.”